R. Salvatore - Echoes of the Fourth Magic

The physicist’s calculations proved accurate, and the two had little trouble finding their way through the tunnel. When the lower exit came into view, Reinheiser put out the torch so as not to attract any unwanted attention in the open night, leaving himself and Mitchell stumbling blindly down the side of the mountain. They finally made it to the silver archway, their adrenaline pumping with the exhilaration of success, and raced across the field of Mountaingate as quickly as they could. Turning into the southwestern pass, they felt a rush of freedom as the rolling plain spread wide before them.

Mitchell punched his fist into the air. “We did it!” he growled with delight. “Think of it, Martin, the next time we see that wretched city, it will be at the head of an army.”

Reinheiser ignored Mitchell’s babbling. “That must be the Calvan scouting party,” he said, pointing to the south where the light of a distant campfire broke the even blackness of the horizon. “I believe we can get there under the cover of the night.”

The distance proved a bit farther than Reinheiser had figured, and the sky in the east had taken on the lighter shade of predawn when the two at last came upon a grassy mound, the encampment set on its flattened top. The fire in the center of the camp had died down to glowing embers, and around it lay the blanketed forms of sleeping men, their horses tethered and standing quietly a short distance away on the south side of the hillock.

“These are soldiers?” Mitchell snickered. “They don’t even know how to set a guard.” But even as he spoke, he and Reinheiser felt the sharp tips of spears against their backs, and the supposedly sleeping men within the camp sprang to their feet, short swords drawn and ready. They stood tall and straight in coats of silvery mail and black cloaks, their small black bucklers bearing silver inlays of sharks.

“Right again,” Reinheiser whispered sarcastically.

“Silence!” one of the Calvans commanded. “Thieves speak only when they are told to speak.”

“We’re not thieves,” Mitchell said.

“Silence!” the Calvan ordered, and the man behind Mitchell poked him with his spear.

“We’re not even armed,” Mitchell protested in a low growl, which drew him a second jab. With the efficiency of trained professionals, two of the swordsmen sheathed their weapons and ran up beside the intruders.

“I am Bracken,” the Calvan leader continued, a weathered man with salt and pepper hair and a steeled, angular face. “Commander of the First Scouts of Pallendara. As the representative of Overlord Ungden in the northern plains, it is within my power to try and execute you where you stand.”

“For what crime?” Mitchell cried, his tone telling Reinheiser that the man was on the verge of an explosion-an outburst that would likely get them both killed.

Bracken, to his credit, remained calm. “To approach an official military patrol without proper request and permission is a primary crime against the Edicts of Ungden,” he recited.

In his stubborn pride, Mitchell was again about to protest when Reinheiser silenced him with a determined nudge. The physicist had recognized a ring that Bracken wore, a black pearl set in gold, and knew better than to argue with this man. Ardaz had warned him of this same symbol during their many discussions. A man who wore such a ring belonged to the Warders of the White Walls, an order of knights that had come into being long before the days of Ungden the Usurper. The sole inspiration behind this band’s existence was to act as efficient and unemotional instruments for the will of whomever sat on Pallendara’s throne, and their dedication to their creed was absolute. They were few in number now, and older, for few had joined the order in the thirty years of Ungden, but, according to Ardaz, who had seemed quite certain on this point, the fanaticism of those that remained had not ebbed, even under the reign of the tyrannical new Overlord. Wearing that ring proved that Bracken was a dangerous man who had to be handled delicately, and Reinheiser knew that meant keeping Mitchell’s mouth shut.

The guards were soon satisfied that the two intruders carried no weapons. However, the man searching Reinheiser did find the parchment and quickly presented it to his commander. Bracken inspected it carefully, recognizing it as some sort of map, though the physicist’s symbols and notations remained unintelligible to him.

“What is this?” he demanded.

Reinheiser scratched his chin. It was time for him to gamble a little, and he knew he would have to word it just right. He looked around at the other Calvans. Young and naive, ambitious pawns to a perverted king, they would be of no use to him. Only Bracken with his insight founded on years of experience could comprehend the weight of his forthcoming statement. Reinheiser eyed the Calvan leader purposefully. “I beg you forgive our ignorance of your foreign laws,” he began.

Bracken cocked an eyebrow; a good sign, Reinheiser noted.

“We came to you only to present you with that map,” he explained. “A gift for Ungden, rightful Overlord of the city of men, from the survivors of yesteryear.”

The Calvan leader didn’t flinch. Eyes boring into the physicist, he slid the parchment into an inside pocket of his cloak and nodded knowingly. Reinheiser smiled in the arrogant assumption that his ploy had saved them, but in truth, this patrol had been sent north not to find Illuma, but in search of the ancient ones. Ungden, or someone in his court, was already aware that the days of the foretold prophecies were at hand.

Assured that these were indeed the men Ungden had sent him to find, Bracken now pondered the implications of delivering them to Pallendara. A crisis approached, and these men would help Ungden through it. Bracken’s devotion to his oath was on trial, and not for the first time since Ungden had stolen Ben-galen’s throne. But the Warder’s oath was his strength, and the order his purpose for living. This decision, like all of his choices, had been made forty years before, when he had sworn in to the Warders of the White Walls.

“Prepare the five swiftest steeds,” he commanded. “We shall escort these intruders to Pallendara, where Overlord Ungden may decide their fate.”

Soon they were off, galloping swiftly across the endless sea of green fields. They did not treat Mitchell and Reinheiser badly, did not bind them as they rode, for the Calvans were not evil men, but Bracken left no doubt of the pair’s status as prisoners, and whenever the party stopped for a rest, their hands were tightly bound.

Normally the ride to Pallendara from Mountaingate would take a full nine days. Too long for Bracken, who, sensing the urgency of this journey, drove his charges and the prisoners to their limits. They rode their mounts hard long after the sun had set each night and rode off again before the next dawn. They passed many farmers out in the fields for the springtime planting, never even slowing down to answer the questioning glances, and they made their evening camps as far from any dwellings as possible.

Impatient to come before Ungden, Mitchell and Reinheiser accepted the exhausting treatment stoically, though their bodies were hardly used to such physical punishment. They were indeed relieved when, on the afternoon of the fifth day, the salty smell of sea water saturated the air.

As they topped a final rise, the last expanse of the Calvan plains opened before them. Far in the distance, beyond the southern shore of Aielle, the blue spray of the Atlantic blurred the line of the horizon. Just below the men, at the end of a long, narrow bay, several groupings of houses lay spread out around an immense white fortress: Pallendara, which the elves called Caer Tuatha, the City of Men. Bracken halted the party for a moment at this fine vantage point, for even at this distance the magnificence of the great city stirred him.